The Ouachita telegraph. [volume] (Monroe, La.) 1865-1889, 1887-01-15
AN uSPuBLIsHED..roEM EDGAR ALLAN
POE.
IN. 0. Picayune.l

of age. while student of the University {
Virginia. These verses, which the autho
then named "The Demon of the Fire' cor
tanning obvious suggestions Of the allitera
tive word painting adopted with powerfu
effect In 'The Raven." and both in thei
rhythm and in the atmosphere of the su
pernntual Investing them are Significantly
suggestive of the weird and fateful picture
limned with 80 mastery hand in eth
Raven" The original copy of these verse
was given by Poe to one of his Southern
at the University. The poem
has never been published.
THE DEMON OF THE FIRE.
In tho deepest death OF midnight,
While the sad and solemn swell
Still was floating, family echoed
From the forests chapel bell;
Family, faltering, floating,
Der the sable waves of air,
That were through the midnight rolling
Chsfed and billowy with the tOlling,
In my cham ber lay dreaming,
And my dreams. were dreams 1oreshad
owed
ofa heart foredoomed to care.
As the last long lingering echo
fthe midnight's mystic chime,
Lfsping through the sable billow
OF the thither shore OF time,
Leaving on the starless silence
Not q shadow or trace,
In q Quivering sigh departed,
From my couch. in fear, started
Started to my feet in terror
For my Dreams phsntasmal error
A frightful, dendish, flaming face.
On the rod hearth's reddest centre,
From blazing knot of oak,
0oAroo1 IN crris0 nd rviho TIM ~, ant
As In terror awoke,
And my slumbering eyelids straining,
As I struggled to the floor
Still In that dread vision seeming,
Hearth, and then, o God! saw it,
And from its flaming jaws it
Spat q ceaseless. seething Kissing,
Bubbling, gurgling stream of gore.
Speechless, struck with stony silence,
Frozen to the floor stood,
Till my very brain seemed kissing
With that kissing bubbling blood,
Till felt my life-stream oozing,
Oozing from those lambent lips.
Till the demon seemed to name me,
Then q wondrous calm o'ercame me,
And I fell back on my pillow,
In apparent soul eclipse.
Thus, as in deaths seeming shadows,
In the icy pail of fear,
I lay stricken, came q hoarse and
d1O0OuS murmur to my ear,
Came a murmur like the murmur
or assassins n'their sleep,
Muttering, higher, higher higher,
II am demon of the fire,
am arch hend Of the fire,
md each blazing roofs my pyre,
md my sweetest incense Is
The blood and tears my victims weep.
"How revel on the prairie,
How roar amidst the pines,
Ef0xv 10,Nu1, oo f1,rOnu1, ho villa
Ger the snow the red flame shines,
How hear the shrek of terror,
With life in every breath,
How scream with lambert laughter
As hurl each cracking rafter
Down the fell abyss of fire,
Until higher. higher, higher,
Leap the high priests Of my altar,
In their merry dance Of death.
II am q monarch OF the fire,
I am royal King of death;
World encircling with the shadow
OF its doom upon my breath,
With the symbol Of hereafter
Cleaning from my fatal face,
I command the eternal fire.
Higher, higher, higher, higher,
Leap my ministering demons
Like phantasmagoric lenans,
Hugging universal nature
In their hideous embrace"
Then sombre silence shut mo
In her solemn, shrouded sleep,
And slumbered like an infant,
In the cradle of the deep,
Till the belfry from the forest
Trembled with tho matin stroke;
And the martins from the edge
or their lichen hidden ledge
Shimmsred through the russell arches,
While the light in torn files marches,
Like routed army struggling
Through the serried ranks of oak.
Through my open fretted easement
Filtered in a tremulous note,
From the tall and shady linden,
Where the robin swelled his throat,
Tiny wooer, brave breasted robin,
Quantity calling for his mate.
From my slumber, nightmare ridden,
With the memory of that dire
Demon in my central fire,
In my eyes' interior mirror
Like the shadow OF fate.
But the fiendish fire had smouldered
To white and formless heap,
And no knot of oak was blazing
As it blazed upon my sleep.
But on the red hearth's rcddest centre.
Where the demons face had shown,
The shadowy lightning seemed TO linger,
And to point with spectre finger
To a Bible, massive, golden
On a table carved an olden.
And bowed and said: CAN power
Is of God and God alone"
Kentucky has genuine poet ia
.obert Burns Wilson, young man
lit over thirty, tail, muscular, with a
urdy frame, and head like Byron.
lis first volume will soon be pub
shed. Several of his fugitive pieces
ave already been published in the
aiding magazines, and have been
Ighly commended by the critics. Will